Look Upon the Cross
Preacher: The Rev. Paulette Magnuson
Scripture: John 18:1-19:42
There is something in us that wants to move quickly past Good Friday. The Easter cross with its flowers waits just ahead, and we know the ending. It is tempting to let that knowledge soften what stands before us now — the hard wood, the outstretched arms, the weight of what was carried there.
But Good Friday asks us to stay. Not to linger in despair, but to be genuinely present to what love looked like when it reached its full expression. Those arms stretched wide were not a gesture. They bore the sorrows and brokenness that we cannot carry ourselves. To look upon the cross honestly is to allow that to mean something — to let the weight register before we reach for the relief.
What makes this possible is not stoicism but faith. And faith, on this day, looks less like certainty and more like the quiet courage of those who have walked this path before us. The cross, for all its darkness, has never stopped being a source of light.
We do not face the cross because we are strong enough to bear it. We face it because Christ has already borne it for us.
Easter will come. But on Good Friday, we stand at the cross. And that, too, is an act of faith.
Reflection Questions
Is there a part of your own life — a grief, a failure, a loss — that you have been tempted to skip past rather than stand before honestly?
When you picture Christ's arms outstretched on the cross, what does it stir in you — and what does it mean to you that those same arms are described as reaching toward you in love?
Good Friday asks us to hold suffering and hope together without resolving the tension too quickly. Where in your life are you being asked to do that right now?
What does it mean to you, personally, that the cross is described here not only as a monument to suffering but as a source of light — and how does that change the way you might face your own dark seasons?
